


By Any Other Name

by sergeant_angel



Series: Evil Eyes and Daring Dodos [8]
Category: Daredevil (2003), Daredevil (TV), Hawkeye (Comics), Young Avengers (Comics)
Genre: F/M, Gen, also i got tired of this sitting in my wips so here ya go, and netflix matt is just a burning garbage can, billy get back here and fix this, crossover time, flailing around the multiverse, i'm sorry this is garbage, like he's a suave dick sure, matt stop thinking about frank seriously bro, mattiepants is a hopeless schmoop, movie matt is kind of a dick, this is not a fic it's a collection of scenes masquerading as a fic, this was supposed to be funny and movie matt just kept being awful
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-15
Updated: 2017-11-15
Packaged: 2019-02-02 21:19:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12734523
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sergeant_angel/pseuds/sergeant_angel
Summary: Two Matts are definitely not better than one.Or, movie-Matt winds up in Netflix-Matt's world.It's Billy's fault.Kate is not having this.





	By Any Other Name

"Never again," Kate mutters to herself as she stomps down the sidewalk. " _Never again_." She reaches up to scratch her scalp, instead encountering something smooth and cool to the touch, which turns out being a browning piece of lettuce.

Kate shakes it off of her hand with a vehemence bordering on violence as she reaches the building and starts up the stairs. _Should_ she be going to her apartment? Yes. Is she instead going to Matt's so she can use up all of his hot water? Also yes.

Sure, Matt won't let her drink coffee this late, but he'll make sympathetic noises as she bitches about Jessica Jones again. He'll make her a hot non-coffee beverage and wrap up her skinned palms and will pretend not to notice when she steals his socks. And then she'll help him prep his closing statement for tomorrow, and it will be nice and domestic and sweet and Kate won't smell like garbage vomit because Matt has a gallon of lemon juice hanging out in his shower for exactly this reason.

Matt's door is unlocked, which is a little disconcerting and prompts Kate to call, "Hey, Matt, it's me. Everything okay?" She slowly creeps down his entryway to see Matt with another person. The other guy is tall, looks like he has red hair. Both of them have the same uneasy set to their shoulders, like they'd had their fists up moments before and only put them down because she interrupted. 

“Kate,” Matt looks relieved, which makes Kate feel exactly the opposite. 

“Who’s your new friend?” she asks, eyeing Tall Red-Haired Guy with what turns out to be absolutely useless suspicion because his eyes are a cloudy, unfocused blue. A slinking, shrieking feeling starts to creep its way up the back of Kate's throat. 

“This is Matt,” Matt says.

“ _This_ had better not be what I think it is,” she warns, swallowing hard against the scream now on the back of her tongue.

“Nothing illegal,” Not Her Matt says with what is probably supposed to be a charming smile, head tilted back.

 “You a lawyer friend or something?” she asks, all faux-innocence that her Matt sees through and frowns at.

“Yes, actually,” Stranger Matt says, grinning more.

This is absolutely what she thinks it is. She manages to diffuse the scream through her teeth as more of a banshee-pitched growl.

“No,” Kate snaps, jabbing a finger at the pair of them. “Absolutely not. No. No. No.”

“I’m sorry?” Other Matt says. “Did I miss something?”

Kate circles him, pulling an arrow out of her quiver and poking the newcomer with the fletched end. Thankfully, he doesn’t erupt into parasitic goo. Which is, of course, always appreciated. Billy's text from this afternoon flashes in her mind. _Hey tracking spell went wrong nothing bad!!!!_ _i_ _hope. Will be_ _mia_ _for next few days everything is fine love you miss you don't worry._

“What the hell, lady?”

She pokes at him a few more times just to establish situational dominance. “Did you come alone?”

“What? Yes?”

“When do you go back to your own universe?”

“What?”

“He doesn’t have Hawkeyes in his universe,” her Matt informs her.

“Bummer for you.”

“I’ve been explaining about the Avengers.”

“So you’re Daredevil, too?”

Multiverse Matt looks stunned. “What?”

“Dude. Your super-senses are seriously lacking.”

“You mostly smell like coffee and Jessica’s cigarettes,” Matt smiles at her. It’s a pretty dopey smile, she has to admit, full of inordinate amounts of gooey fondness and sappy sweet nothings. “You don’t smell like me so much.”

“Why would she—oh,” Not Her Matt says. He makes a face. “You don’t have an Elektra here, then?”

“I love Elektra,” Kate returns the arrow to its home. “I would seriously consider dating Elektra if I wasn’t dating Matt and if she was, like, thirteen percent less angsty.”

“Really?” her Matt looks at her, curious. “Only thirteen?”

“Not the time,” she interrupts. 

“You _started_ it.”

“I’ve heard it both ways.”

“Look,” Multiverse Matt says. “I don’t know how I got here. I don’t know how I’m going to get back.”

“Yeah, I might have a lead on that. Billy," she says to Matt's questioning head tilt. "I can make a call to try and get you back. Don’t know if she’s in the middle—“

“Already called America,” her Matt cuts her off. “Had to leave a message.”

“Since when do you have America’s number?”

“Since she and I get lunch once a month?”

“ _What_?”

Kate’s mind sort of implodes at the thought of her two favorite punchy-people eating and drinking together, getting into fistfights together, probably fighting intergalactic wars together...

“I thought I told you that.”

“Don’t think so.” Kate sighs and sticks her hand out to Multiverse Matt. “Don’t act like you don’t know I’m trying to shake your hand, Mister. I _will not_ have that shit.”

“Oh! Right.” He shakes her hand. Firm grip; his fingers are longer than her Matt’s, hands narrower. He’s altogether more lanky and entirely too skinny, his hair a brighter red, long and spiky but still managing to flop across his forehead.

She frowns. "You look like a Muppet."

Her Matt chokes on a laugh.

….

The name _M_ _uppet_  sticks. It's not exactly nice, but it's easier, and the name sticks because it's annoying and so is he. 

He and Kate are sharing takeout in his apartment, the three of them trying to figure out what to do with the interloper until they can find a way to get him back to his own universe.

Matt is picking all of the beef out of the pad Thai and pretending like he doesn’t know what Kate is talking about when she calls him on it. He'd feel worse if she hadn't inhaled the sticky rice.

 Anyway, the point is that things are fine and then the Muppet grabs at Kate's wrist as she walks by and half a second later he is flat on his ass. 

"Do not," she says, her voice even in the way she has that means _I am trying very hard not to kill you_. "Ever. Touch me without permission."

The Muppet must smirk because Matt can hear Kate tighten her grip. "I'm sorry. Did I say something funny?"

Muppet Matt coughs. "No, ma'am."

Kate's _hmmm_ is rife with disdain, because apparently Frank Castle is the only person who can get away with calling her _ma'am._ She releases Matt's hand and he shakes it out. 

"Sorry," he says. 

"You don't just go around grabbing strange women," Kate pulls him to his feet. "Seriously, dude."

"It's how Elektra and I met."

"You _grabbed_ her?"

"No! Well, sort of? We fought on a playground."

"You _grabbed her_ on a _playground_?" Kate's voice rises in pitch with every word.

"That was –that's not what I meant. It was daylight! She kicked my ass."

"I should hope so!"

"Hey," Muppet Matt holds up his hands placatingly. "Look, I'm sorry. I think we've gotten off on the wrong foot. I'm not trying to be rude or disrespectful."

Kate _hmms_ again, slightly more believing than the last one. 

Matt isn't convinced. He and the other Matt aren't the same, but they are also the same person. There's just something about the other version of himself. Matt isn't sure he like it.

...

He's actually not _bad_ , is the thing. Kate shouldn't be surprised. Her Matt has court, Muppet Matt doesn't have a job here, America is still MIA, and Billy and Teddy are off-world at some sort of princely Skrull ceremony. Billy has been very apologetic in a mostly insincere way.

Anyway.

He's a lot less boxer and a lot more ninja—unlike her Matt, Muppet Matt is pretty settled as Daredevil. Seven years of dedicated hero-ing is a lot, and it shows. 

Well, it shows in how he handles himself, if not in how he dresses. 

"So, you wear baggy suits because your Daredevil outfit is latex?"

"It's not latex."

"I misspoke. It's leather."

"It's not leather, either."

Kate scoffs at him. "If it looks like leather and it talks like leather, it's leather."

"You're, um, what the word? Oh, right. Insane."

He presses his foot more firmly on the mugger's windpipe.

She's about to retort with the fact that he's a _dick_ but stops herself because he's really not. Sure, he has dickish qualities, but he also sensed she was white-knuckling her way through Matt's serial rapist case, which is why they are hanging out in Central Park, taking out muggers. 

"I hate you," she says as they tie an unconscious mugger to a tree. It's mostly true.

"You make the best coffee I've ever tasted," he says, clearly trying to mollify her.

"I've had your coffee, Muppet. That's not saying much."

…

Matt is fairly certain his alternate universe counterpart has a thing for Kate.

Matt can’t say he’s surprised, exactly. Other-Matt is incredibly different—his world, his whole life, is different—but once you get past Kate’s prickly exterior, she’s kind of a marshmallow. 

And she’s—brilliant, he supposes is as good a way as any to put it. Not just in intelligence, but her personality has a sort of flame-to-moth thing going on. It's nice? Maybe it's nice, that another version of him gets how great Kate is. 

It's just--

"Oh my _god_ Muppet," Kate throws her hands up in exasperation. "I cannot even with you. Matt, can _you_ please try and convince alterna-you that going to visit our universe's Wilson Fisk is a bad—nay, a _horrendous_ idea."

"He won't know it's me."

"You're a blind attorney named Matt!" Kate lets out a deep _ugh_ and stomps up the stairs to the roof, slamming the door behind her. "Futzing _muppet_ ," she says, knowing full well both of them will hear her. 

"Your girlfriend is mean," Muppet Matt says. He doesn't sound too upset by it.

Matt doesn't dignify the statement with a response. 

"Why do you date someone who is so mean?"

Matt sets down the brief he's reading. "Look, if you're attracted to Kate, that's one thing, but you and I aren't talking about her like that."

"Like what?" Muppet Matt gives a nervous chuckle. "I don't know what you're talking about. She's a great girl, don't get me wrong--"

"Unbelievable." Matt snorts. "You can't lie to me, and I can't lie to you, let's just accept that. And you know exactly what I'm talking about."

 _Oh my god_ _,_ _Trish_ _,_ Matt can hear Kate on her phone. _What do you mean she jumped out of a twenty story building and landed on her feet,_ _are_ _we talking landed like a cat or landed in a crater_ _or--_

"This isn't like you and your Elektra, where you smelled her in a café and then followed her around--"

"That's not what happened--"

"Kate's been through enough in her life without you slavering after her--"

" _Slavering_ , whoa--"

"--like a dudebro."

"What. The hell. Is a _dudebro_."

The door to the roof swings open. "Are you two having a pissing contest?"

"Yes," says the Muppet, while Matt says "no."

"Hmm. Care to try that again?"

"Yes," say Muppet, and Matt sticks with _no_.

"Well. That's not suspicious or anything. Muppet, is your Foggy better at lying than you are, too?"

"No. Well—no."

"Right, so that's a yes, then." Kate takes the stairs in three jumps. "What are we fighting about?"

"Nothing." This they are in agreement about.

"That's also not suspicious at all."

Kate shifts her weight from foot to foot in a way that means she isn't buying the bullshit and that he's going to have to pay up sooner or later. "Right. Well. I have to go help Jess with a Thing. Go punch a predator or something."

"Tell Jess that if you come home with another rib out I'm holding her personally responsible."

"Promises, promises," she mutters. Even though he can tell she's mad, Kate still crosses to give him a goodbye peck.

She's to the street before other-Matt breaks the silence. "She's definitely coming back with a rib out, isn't she?"

"Oh, undoubtedly," Matt says, and for a minute he forgets that he doesn't like this alternate version of himself.

Alternate Matt senses the moment he remembers, though. "I'm not trying to steal your girlfriend."

"You thinking she could be stolen implies that you think I _own_ her--"

"Oh, for God's sake," Matt throws his hands up. "I'm trying to be a good guy, here!"

Matt thinks of Frank for no reason at all, heavy with muscle and the smell of guns and explosives soaked into his skin. _Don't worry, Red. Not Your Girl is safe with me._ She's not my girl. _I know, Red, that's why I called her Not Your Girl._ She has a name. _Red, since when do I call anyone by their name?_

What's the world coming to when Frank Castle's company is preferable to your own?

"Whatever," Matt finally says. "It's your business. But I'm not going to complain to you, or let you pine over her with me. We're not friends."

"I wouldn't want to be friends with an asshole like you anyway. Who'da though I'd be such a _dick?_ "

...

Matt does go out to punch a predator, as Kate suggested. Other Matt also took her advice, but went in the exact opposite direction, which is nice. 

There's just something grating about the other man. Maybe it's that he could be Matt, if his situation was different. Maybe it's unnerving that he doesn't have a Kate, and it's making Matt more acutely aware of how lucky _he_ is to have one. 

When he gets back, Kate is there, rib out, and other Matt is sitting at the table with his shirt off as Kate bandages up a knife wound.

"How are all your scars on your back?" She asks, running her fingers along one. "Do you turn your back on your opponents or what?" She dances her fingers across his shoulders. "Do you have a Claire in your world?"

"A Claire? No. I've got a Karen, though. Does that count?"

"Not really. I mean, Karen's great but I don't think she's medically trained so she doesn't count for this. Oh, hey Matt!"

"Hey." He presses a kiss to her forehead. "You have a rib out."

"Tell me something I don't know."

...

Kate traces his scars that night, and he _knows_ it's because of the other one, but he doesn't mind. She knows them—the ones she wasn't there for he's told her about, little by little. She mouths words as she touches him, a list of people who have hurt him. Nobu, Nobu, Nobu, Fisk, Stick, Stick, Elektra, human traffickers, arms dealers, a mugger, on and on. She always ends with the one along his side, the blow from Nobu that almost killed him. 

They have history. They have something rich and heavy that gets better every day, and that's something the stupid Muppet can't give her

"What were you guys fighting about, anyway?" Kate's voice is sleep-slurred, aided by the fact that Matt is dragging his fingertips up and down her arm. 

And Matt's exhausted, too, wrung out from a day in court and dealing with his multiverse counterpart and Foggy and the Irish mob, which is probably why he tells Kate the truth. "You."

"You were fighting about me?"

It sounds stupid, hearing her say it like that. It makes him sound like an asshole who can't let other people talk about his girlfriend. "He's attracted to you."

"He told you that?"

"Kate." Matt stills his hand. "It's me. Remember me, Matt, the guy who can hear heartbeats and--"

Kate presses her lips to his, effectively shutting him up. "So are you jealous or turned on?"

" _What._ "

"Do you dislike the idea of me with somebody else or do you like it?"

"Are you trying to break up with me?" Matt doesn't really think so, but it never hurts to check.

"If I wanted to break up with you I'd say 'Matt, I think we should break up.' I'm trying to figure out your angle."

"Angle? I just thought you had the right to know he's ogling you."

"Matt, I'm Kate Bishop. People ogle me all the time."

"Well, it's good to know your ego isn't hurting." Matt goes back to stroking her arm.

"It's the money. And you still haven't answered my question."

"It seems like a loaded question." Matt thinks for half a second. "Clint told you he'd have a threesome with himself, didn't he."

"Yep."

"Well, I don't want to have a threesome with the other Matt. Do you?"

"Muppet? God, no."

Matt stifles a laugh. "You really need to stop calling him Muppet."

"How are people supposed to know who I'm talking about?"

"Yeah, that's an excellent reason to call a person a puppet."

"Hey, Muppets are cool. Oh my god. Look at that face. You're totally jealous of him. You're _jealous_."

"Am not." He goes back to stroking her arm. "Maybe a little. You bandaged him up."

"He was bleeding."

"You groped him."

Kate freezes under his hand. "What. Oh my god. Is that what that looked like? Was I groping him? Is scar touching considered groping now oh my god--"

Matt laughs and whatever was happening in his chest loosens and disappears. "Kate. I'm kidding. I mean, I think he got something out of that that you didn't intend, but I'm not worried about it. Honest."

Kate burrows in closer, like a reward for honesty. "He's so weird. I'm pretty sure his Earth is like a cleverly disguised version of hell. Also, he straight-up kills people."

"I've straight-up killed people before," he feels the need to remind her.

"Okay, first of all, nothing you do is straight."

He nods in acquiescence.

"It's a bigger moral dilemma for you." Kate is silent for so long he thinks she's about to fall asleep. "You know what I think the biggest difference between the two of you is? You still believe that people are good, that they can change. He doesn't."

Another silence, this one expectant, the ones that come before Kate confessing something she feels is important. 

"I love that about you," she says, pressing her face against his chest with a sigh.

 _Because you love me_ , he thinks, giving himself a rare mental high-five. They've been together for almost three years. He should probably be used to this by now.

...

"This is terrible rain, Matt. This is cold gross almost winter rain, what are we doing? You're going to catch a cold and die--"

"Kate!" He wonders if this is even worth it, if Matt was just screwing with him. Kate will tell him because they have a weird tentative friendship, and then she'll know that this was a Muppet move--

"If this is about seeing me in the rain or whatever, I appreciate the romance of the sentiment and whatever weatherman updates you were planning on giving me but would not a shower serve the same purpose?"

The blood rushes to his cheeks. "He _told_ you?"

"He's told me all of his seduction techniques which is really weird now that I say it out loud. Matt. Come on. Shower. Warm water. Me, shampooing your hair. So much better than freezing rain."

"Salient points." He scoops her up and kicks the door open, carrying her down the stairs to his apartment. "I'm not sure if I should be apologizing right now?"

"For seducing me? You're always seducing me. I'm used to it."

"How. _How_ am I always seducing you?" Matt sets her on the counter in the bathroom, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. 

"Well, that, for one. You know I like your forearms, Matt. That's seduction. And when you bleed all over the couch, that's clearly you trying to seduce me— _gahh_ _!!_ " Her argument devolves into shrieks as Matt begins to tickle her.

…

They do, eventually, make it in to the shower. Matt realizes that the reason he's never paid attention to water hitting Kate's face is because he's always been focused on other things when they shower together—their blood and other people's blood swirling down the drain. Taking stock of injuries. Just holding each other because they aren't dead, not tonight. Remembering that wet tile is just about the absolute worst thing you can try and get busy on when your girlfriend falls off of buildings and is massively concussion-prone.

So, yes. It's nice to see her this way. More than anything, though, it just reminds him of all the reasons he loves her.

...

"Did it work?" Matt asks him in the morning. "The rain thing?"

"You _told_ her about it!" Matt hisses back. "How was it supposed to work when you _tell_ her about it?"

"Well, I mean," Matt shrugs. You can hear the smirk in his voice. " _Was_ it supposed to work?"

"What is your _deal_ , man? Do you just hate Kate? Why are you screwing with her, she's a good person!"

"Ah." Muppet whisks his cane through the air, pointing it at Matt's heart. "But you're not."

Matt is so shocked he can't even come up with something to say. 

"You forget, Mattie. We might be different—we might have been blinded differently, faced different foes. We might fight differently and have different loves, but we're still the same person. We," he swings his cane through the air with a high whistle. "Are a shitty person. And she's going to wind up hurt because of us. Because of _you_."

Matt is once again stunned into silence, groping for words before hysterical laughter bursts from him. "I'm sorry," he says. "But have you actually _met_ Kate? She winds up hurt without any help from me."

"I know," Muppet is unfazed. "Do you ever stop to think she gets hurt _more_ because of you? You're a mess. This is early years for you, and I remember those. You get the shit kicked out of you a lot. You think you might be dragging her down? Cause I do. I've seen her work. She's better than you."

The laughter dies on Matt's lips. He's not going to fall for this. He and Kate have had this discussion too many times, they've fought too much and too hard for him to be an idiot about it again. They are a team. They do better together. 

"She deserves better than you," Muppet Matt says. "We both know it. Tell me it isn't true."

"What, and you do?" Matt scoffs. "Seriously."

"I didn't say that. I mean, we do make a great team."

"I think I hate you."

"The feeling is entirely mutual, I assure you."

…

Foggy is a pretty chill person, so when he shows up at Kate's secret coffee spot, plops down across from her, and says, "That other Matt is a dick," she pays attention.

"He's like. Baiting Matt. Our Matt. The good Matt. I'm pretty sure the other one is evil."

"He's not evil. He's just...."

"A dick," Foggy finishes, shoving a muffin in front of her. "I want him to go home."

"I'm trying! Nobody is returning my calls! Anyway, he's got to have some redeeming qualities, right?"

Foggy raises an eyebrow at her as if to say _tell me another,_ _haha_ _._

"He's got," Kate starts. "He's really—he's tall."

"Tall isn't a personality trait. Why are you so determined to make him seem nice?"

"I don’t! I'm just giving him the benefit--"

"Kate, if his name wasn't Matthew Murdock, would you be letting him get away with all the crap he's done?"

Kate shuts her mouth with a snap so hard it hurts her teeth. "Well."

"Our Matt isn't perfect, I'm not saying that. These are just two different people who happen to share a name. Stop making excuses for him."

"I'm not—am I?"

Foggy gives her a critical once-over. "Yeah. Kinda. Yeah. You feel bad for him, right? Because he's alone. Even in his world, he's kind of alone. And he doesn't have a you."

"Yeah, but—oh. Ew. That's super vain of me, isn't it? I feel bad for him because he doesn't have a Kate in his world? That's— _why am I this person?_ "

"Because you're nice. And a little conceited. But only a little!" Foggy ducks like he expects her to throw something at him. "It's kinda cute. Or it would be, if he wasn't...him."

Kate's phone starts playing _She's beauty and she's grace, she's queen of fifty states_ and Kate huffs a relieved sighs as she answers it. "America! Finally! Where have you been? Are you okay?"

"Fine, I'm fine. What did you need? You left me fifty messages."

"I need you to take somebody back to their universe. Billy did a thing."

"Of course he did. Someone we know?"

"Well, it's. It's Matt, actually."

"No kidding. You guys have a threesome?"

Foggy snorts into his coffee. 

"Why does everyone think that? NO."

"Which universe?"

"How am I supposed to know? He doesn't."

"I've met a few Daredevils. Maybe we've met. Does he look like yours?"

"No, he, um. He kind of looks like a Muppet? Beaker."

" _That_ asshole?"

Foggy laughs so hard, he chokes on his muffin.

**Author's Note:**

> and then America picked him up and shipped him home the end
> 
> i'm sorry that's all I've got


End file.
